


girls deserve the world

by doglesbian



Category: AFK Arena
Genre: F/F, Fix-It, Gen, Trauma Recovery, lesbian adoptive moms, tw for i guess just everything thats in the sisters stories?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-14
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2020-03-05 11:34:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18827866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doglesbian/pseuds/doglesbian
Summary: Two sisters, orphaned and exiled and forced to kill for survival. They deserve better.





	girls deserve the world

**Author's Note:**

> sometimes u read something and youre like these characters deserve better and when ur a writer/content creator u can give them better so i did that. enjoy

Vedan was not good. Silvina was vaguely aware of this. She despised the man, and hated the things she'd done for him, but she did not regret it. She had killed to keep her sister safe, even if she didn't understand the weight of her actions, but she would do these deeds as many times as she needed to. Vedan was the only safety she had found, and she was willing to pay its price.

There was only one thing she feared; how long would Vedan's patience last? He was fickle and fearsome, and had already lashed out at them before. He was growing stronger with time. Would he outpace the sisters and decide they had become useless? Would they make a mistake that'd leave them dead? These possibilities scared Silvina more than any of her missions or the things she had to kill. Her fear drove her to please Vedan as much as possible, desperate to stay in his favor. 

Remaining clever, however, she secretly dove into books and tales that she could steal away with, praying to hear of a paradise. She had found some, although few and far between: sanctuaries, mythical safe zones, protectors and wild havens. Many she read of she and Isabella had already approached, and been rejected for their grim looks. But the few untried and unknown she catalogued, preparing as much as she could for possible emergencies. The secret compartment in her room stored their supplies for if they had to leave at a moments notice.

Having found and lost and found again a place of mercy, it was painful to think of losing it again. But fear of the evil man and need for a sense of security drove her to ride through the pain. She would protect her sister, at all costs.

* * *

Isabella was quite young, and not exceptionally observant as a result. Her awareness of the events happening around her was blurred, and she leaned on her sister for guidance.

She still didn’t comprehend very well how they had gotten here. Someone had killed their parents, left them orphaned, and Isabella, by some will of the spirits, had killed those someones. But instead of being treated as a hero, offered support, or anything of the sort, her sister had to take her far away before the townspeople killed her for being a “monster.” She still didn’t know what she had done wrong, or why they would think that or act that way. Her sister reassured her when she could that they were wrong, that she wasn’t a monster, but she still feared her powers.

Her understanding of her current situation was that Vedan was a bad man, who made her do things she didn’t really want to do. She had hurt people before, but she had seen them hurting people beforehand. She didn’t know these people. If it weren’t for her sister’s affirmations that he was too strong for that, she would have tried to blast Vedan the same way she did with all the bad men.

Her understanding of the situation this exact day came down to plain facts; there was yelling from Vedan for a while, and suddenly Silvina burst into their shared room, grabbing a bag she had never seen before and showing her how to safely climb out of the window. It was all a whirlwind to her, confused as all hell but willing to trust the guiding hand of sister, as always.

She kept mumbling things Isabella couldn’t hear, names and curses and prayers. If it weren’t for her being so blown away, Isabella would probably be crying.

It was halfway through a long grassy field, far away from town, that Isabella started to understand that they were running from Vedan. She was scared, the memories of being stuck on the streets barely surviving flowing back to her, but she did her best to stay strong, not to cry or at least stay moving, at least until they stopped running, until the world stopped flashing past her.

They came to the edge of a massive forest, seeming almost endless from their perspective. “This… is the best place I could think of. I promise, Isa, we’re going to be okay.”

Only a few steps into the treeline they stopped to collapse against a tree in exhaustion, Isabella finally crashing and giving heaving sobs, holding her face against Silvina to keep it quieter, like she had learned. In the silence of the forest, the sound still traveled wide, but she couldn’t stop herself.

Silvina held her close, doing all she could to console her sister. The fear in her voice and tension in her movements gave away her own emotional breakdown, but she persisted in trying to give comfort.

* * *

Lyca stood at her post, guarding her section of the edge of the forest, as usual. Despite years of working together, she still jumped at the way Ira seemed to appear from nowhere.

“Commander, someone came into the forest, over west of my post. They didn’t go far in, just stopped at a tree somewhere inside. I didn’t fire at them because… they look like kids. I think they were crying. I’m not good with kids. Could you go check it out?”

Lyca wasn’t entirely sure how to respond besides accepting the task, just plain confused. She made her way to them as fast as she could manage.

When she scouted them out, she didn’t announce her presence. They weren’t sneaking or concealing themselves, unsuspicious in every way besides the fact of where they were. They had the obvious appearance of Graveborn, the trademark gray skin giving it away. Usually that was a sign of evil, of dabblers in black arts, but one of them looked like a teenager and the other couldn’t be more than ten. She couldn’t accept the idea that these two were dangerous, or evil. Everything about them said they were just frightened children trying to hide from something. The idea of a trap was out of her head as well, knowing that this kind of trick would be unprecedented by any enemy of the Wilders.

She rung out with a “hello?”, doing her best to seem unimposing. The sisters seemed to freeze, choking down sobs. “It’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m here to help.” The older looking one held a stoic but fearful face, while the other buried her face deeper into her companion, trying in some way to hide.

“You don’t have to tell me anything. Just let me get you somewhere safer. Do you two have anywhere to go? I can take you home.”

Silvina was silent, refusing to let her guard down, but Isabella let herself slip, words muffled in the cloth she had buried herself in. “We don’t have a home…”

Lyca held down the shock and confusion and questions she had. These girls needed to feel safe more than she needed to know things. “That’s fine. I have a place you can stay.”

She called for her stag, which she had left standing a short ways away. They both looked exhausted, and a ride was a great idea to Lyca.

Silvina remained still, resistant and still fearful, but after a moment of deliberation she stood and let Lyca help her onto the mount. Isabella shortly followed, wrapping her arms around her sister from behind.

The walk to her home and the village was long and mostly silent. Isabella seemed content to lay into her sister’s back, staring idly at the foliage that passed her. Silvina kept her sight locked to a particular spot on the back of the stag’s neck.

* * *

 

When Nemora’s wife spontaneously brought two children home with no forewarning, she had many questions but she was able to take Lyca’s advice to let the girls rest before stressing them with interrogation. She cooked a good meal for them, caring for them and letting the sisters have the silence they seemed to need. When the sun set they were given a room and bed, and a caring reminder that if they needed anything Lyca and Nemora were just down the hall.

It was on the third day of their residence that the one of the sisters began to let her guard down. The smaller one, Isabella, had felt enough comforts to confide in the wives, slowly and tearfully telling their story, of their orphaning and exile, their rule under evil, their grand escape. Some of the details were more than shocking, but the two girls made sure to focus on comforting the child, wiping away tears and giving hugs as needed.

Nemora felt glad that her healing prowess extended out of the physical realm. It was obvious that these girls would need a lot of care. Silvina was the harder one to crack. She had built up such a defense of herself and her sister that her emotional barrier was strong. Nemora’s prescription for it was gentle, careful care, respecting Silvina’s boundaries to let her realize things were going to be okay on her own.

It had been on the night that the wives had returned with new clothes for the sisters that she seemed to finally take it in. There was a moment where she stared at the soft pajamas, carefully woven and adorned with silly pictures of sheep, and the tears started to stream down her cheeks, finally accepting a hug from Nemora. Some of her defensiveness remained after, but it was progress.

Isabella was, in a way, easier to help. She was mostly a scared child who needed hugs and reassurance and not much more. Her magic occasionally came up, her letting loose that she was scared of what she could do, was scared of being a monster, of Lyca and Nemora being scared of her and leaving her. Being in a village of magic users helped with that, both in making her feel more normal and having the tools and expertise to teach her control and guide her to healthier uses of her skills. Harming magic was just opposite to healing, and with the best healer around being her caretaker it was easy as pie to teach her the art.

Silvina found a way to repurpose her skills as well, the shared proficiency in daggers between her and Kaz becoming a bonding activity, with Kaz being sure to teach her nicer things to do with them. They carved wood figures together, and learned how to do stylish and fancy tricks. Kaz’s carefree attitude helped Silvina open up more as well.

The sister’s bonds never decreased in strength, but over time they shifted from their messy codependency to a healthier relationship.

After a fair while it was obvious that adoption was the right idea. There wasn’t much to it, since the Wilders weren’t very bureaucratic; a special private ceremony was official enough for them. The first time each wife heard themselves called “mom” their hearts had melted, and the sisters gained a sense of warmth from the sense of having real, actualized mothers.

The road to recovery was not short or easy, but Lyca and Nemora were willing to trek it and guide their new daughters to better places. They’d stop at nothing, because they knew their girls deserved the world, and they would provide.


End file.
